In this jarringly anti-Muslim thriller, a US stealth cruise missile veers off course during the Gulf War and lands intact in the Iranian desert, giving the government a prototype from which to develop its own cruise missiles and to take up where Saddam Hussein left off. Bakhtiar, a fundamentalist in the Iranian government, arranges to have the prime minister and his right hand man murdered. Once in power, Bakhtiar gets the Ayatollah's blessings to hit a series of oil tankers in the Gulf, making it clear that he will cut off the flow of oil to the West until Iran's economy is resuscitated. Working against him are James Duke, the pilot hero of Nightstalker (1992) and Strike of the Cobra (1993), and an ensemble cast that includes Mark Collins, a CIA agent posing as a weapons trader who is sent in to reactivate communication with ``Zenith''; a female Iranian engineer who had been sending the Agency information; U.S. Vice Admiral Nelson Zachiem III, a politically ambitious career officer eager to prove the Navy can clean up this mess with minimal help from the Air Force; and Democratic senator Paula Jenrette, whose leaks to CNN are implausibly blamed for the outbreak of the war. Rizzi is at his best describing the different airplanes, radars, and weapons and how they all work together. His understanding of Muslim fundamentalism is superficial at best, racist at worst, and although he gives lip service to his female characters' intelligence, ``Zenith'' is a damsel in distress complete with chador, and Jenrette is a soft-headed liberal with blood on her hands. Only Duke and his fellow top guns end up looking good; as everyone else fades out of the picture, they conduct a high speed chase that pits complex US military technology against the Iranians chasing Collins and ``Zenith'' across the medieval landscape. Thin plot, thinner characterizations, great techno-speak and top-gun action. (Maps and diagrams, not seen)
Pub Date: Sept. 20, 1994
ISBN: 1-55611-391-9
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Donald Fine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 1994
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
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